Dwayne Johnson, Dany Garcia, Beau Flynn Developing ‘Muscle Beach’ Series at USA Network

Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, his co-founder Dany Garcia and Beau Flynn are developing a “Muscle Beach” series with USA Network, Variety has learned.

“Muscle Beach” — an hourlong scripted drama — is set in a legendary bodybuilding gym in ’80s Venice Beach where a colorful tribe of lost souls struggle to reinvent themselves by bench-pressing their way to a bigger, better American dream, no matter what the cost. The series explores the body-obsessed fitness movement that took the nation by storm at the time of the supersized Reagan ’80s, the excess of the era and the many temptations of Los Angeles that will expose the dark side of chasing dreams.

The script is penned by Jeremiah Friedman and Nick Palmer, who will also serve as exec producers. Johnson and Garcia will exec produce through their Seven Bucks Productions banner, and Flynn of FlynnPictureCo. Seven Bucks’ Hiram Garcia and Brian Gewirtz, plus FlynnPictureCo’s Wendy Jacobson will also produce.

The writers and producers are the same team that sold the sci-fi action comedy feature “Alpha Squad 7,” starring Johnson, to DreamWorks — now Amblin Partners — this year.
Alex Sepiol and Tiffany Hawthorne bought the script for USA Network. Universal Cable Production’s Dawn Olmstead, Kate Fenske and Garrett Kimble will oversee the project for the studio.

The project is the second Muscle Beach-inspired TV project to be announced this week. Yesterday, Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a deal with CBS Television Studios to develop “Pump,” a series about his Venice Beach-based bodybuilding youth.